Chapter three

Sometimes dreams and nightmares can seem too real for words. There are times when you wake up in the middle of the night and can remember everything; from sights, to sounds, to even tastes and smells. A Chinese philosopher (Zhuangzi to be exact) had a theory that dreams were really linked to real world experiences; this idea was later reintroduced by religions and other philosophers. They said that our minds were so complex we did things in our sleep that were linked to things happening around us in the 'real' world. Things like you wetting the bed, hearing voices, smelling things; it can all be linked to the world around our physical bodies.

Why am I giving you a lesson on all of this?

Because as of late it's hard to tell the two apart. The argument Haruhi and I had in the classroom felt real enough, but the next day I woke up and had no idea what happened the rest of the night. How had I gotten from the classroom back to walking up the hill? What if I'd fallen asleep? Then was all of this a dream? Haruhi's pretending not to know who I am and the brigade doesn't exist, what does it all mean? If anyone out there knows can you please tell me. Soon.

I started to think about the way Haruhi had acted, but that was the problem. She didn't seem like she was acting, she seemed like she honestly had no idea who I was. She didn't talk to me, she didn't go out of her way to cause me discomfort and because of it my day had been fairly-

"Normal," I muttered, stopping in my step as I glanced up at the sky. "Maybe that's it," I told myself out loud. Kind of weird because I hardly ever do, but it wasn't like anyone was around; my walks up that hill were always lonely.

I thought back to our fight the day before. Didn't she say she wished she'd never met me? The looks the others had on their faces and the fact all of a sudden I was on my way to school clarified she had indeed done something. Maybe, by some twist of fate and strange Haruhi logic, I had made my own wish come true.

My wish that everything was normal.

I guess the more I thought about it, as I walked, the more I realized it did in fact make sense. I wanted a normal life, Haruhi wished we'd never met; if we never met then everything would be normal? I never spoke to Haruhi that first day (or something) and we never became friends. We never made the brigade. We never did any of the things we did in the past.

For once something made sense, and I wasn't sure if I liked the outcome.

Then again, maybe it was a good thing. Now I could actually study, I could go about my daily life without worry of it being blown up and being my fault. I would be able to do a bunch of new things I'd always wanted to do before Haruhi became the number one importance in my life (or so she viewed it).

I felt my lips curl into a smile as I approached the school.

Today was going to be a good day for once. A good normal day.

--

As predicted, the day started out at my shoe locker, where Taniguchi and Kunikida met me. I must have been physically happier because both of them asked me what I was so cheerful about. I gave a half-hearted reply that I had a feeling it would be a good day. After that, they discussed various things that I ignored. I could care less which one of them lost their games or what they ate for dinner the night before.

My eyes were stuck on the girl several lockers down you see. Haruhi was getting her own shoes out, switching them and looking around suspiciously. Didn't she know there were no aliens around here? I smiled to myself again and headed to class when she went to another hallway. Maybe Haruhi was in the process of finding herself a new chore boy. I felt back for the poor guy who came into Haruhi's vision and was caught in her unknown trap. Then again, better them than me. Haruhi thought of her friends and classmates as pawns, in a way; like a spider catching a fly or a cat playing with its captured mouse. It wouldn't surprise me if she already had a few candidates.

I wondered about the others as I entered the class and spotted Miss Asakura. She walked over and greeted me with a heartfelt 'good morning Kyon' and it reminded me a lot of Miss Asahina. I returned the greeting, but as soon as I got to my desk and sat down, my smile vanished and I remembered the other brigade members. Besides Haruhi, there was the smart and quiet Nagato, the ever charming well-endowed Miss Asahina, and the clever yet annoying Koizumi. I actually missed them; They were, after all, my friends or what I considered friends at least.

I waited patiently for Haruhi to take her seat. It took a good while until she even came into the class room; and from there she was bombarded by other classmates asking questions, saying good morning, trying to start petty conversations; and through it all, Haruhi said not a word. When they were finally done, Haruhi gave her bitter frown and replied with a "I have no time to deal with you meaningless humans."

That was it.

Everyone evaporated into the background as though it had never happened, but I could just barely hear them saying her name now and then. It seemed since Haruhi and I hadn't spoken, she'd become a bit more popular. Still strange in their eyes, but fascinatingly so to where everyone wanted to know more about her. Lucky me, I already knew plenty.

When she did sit down, she immediately glued her eyes to the window to her left, waiting like she usually did. I looked over at her out of the corner of my eyes, having to shift in my seat a little, then slowly I turned fully around. "Hey Haruhi," I said in my casual tone, loud to get her attention. Her eyes snapped over to mine and I could have swore we had a staring contest from hell for a few seconds.

"Yeah what?" She asked in almost the exact same tone. Talking to Haruhi was almost like playing chess against the one who invented the game. They knew all the tricks and moves and at any second could make one up, and guess what, you'd never even know it. That was exactly how Haruhi logic was, and in a way really was how things worked. According to the others anyway.

"How are Nagato and Koizumi doing?" I asked to see if it would spark something or if she'd have no clue like before. "I would hope you're not torturing Miss Asahina anymore than needed," I added and Haruhi had the same reaction as the day before.

Her face scrunched up and she glared at me with those piercing hazelnut brown eyes, "you should stop talking to me before I have to put charges on you." She said matter-of-factly. Ah, white pawn E2 to E4.

I was almost shocked by her proposal, realizing she'd given me an opening though, I took the bait. "You would actually place charges on someone just for talking to you?" I countered with black pawn E7 to E5.

"Talking to me without any consent from myself," Haruhi pointed out as though she'd won the argument. "You should apologize, especially since I have no idea what you are talking about. If you're trying to get my attention so you can say something, then just say it. Don't jerk me around."

Why did I miss her speaking to me again? I'm still not sure why, I should have left it at that, but something compelled me to continue our sadistic conversation. "I'm not jerking you around, I was just wondering. If you have no idea, just say it. You don't have get so mad." Great, now I sounded like her.

"I do have to get 'so mad' because you are wasting my time." She countered.

"Oh I'm sorry, I didn't realized staring out the window was so painstaking."

"For your information," Haruhi said slamming her hands on her desk, half standing in her seat, hunched over enough to look down on me. "I'm not just staring out the window, I'm waiting." The class was staring now.

"For what?" I scoffed, "alien invaders?"

That must have taken her by surprise because her glare vanished, replaced by a look of confusion. "Yeah, how did you know?" She asked perplexed.

This time, I was the one who didn't answer to her games. I turned back around as the bell rang and our teacher walked in to give us that days assignments. I just sat back and listened; and throughout the day I could actually sense Haruhi staring at me. I must have really freaked her out or something.

Nothing was wrong up until lunch, but the second the bell rang Haruhi had bolted out. I kind of wondered where she was going since she left with an odd expression on her face. I tried to ignore it when Taniguchi and Kunikida migrated over to my desk, since I didn't go to theirs. "Kyon, are you crazy?" Was the first thing Taniguchi asked when he sat down, eyes wide for some reason.

"What do you mean?" I asked looking out my window, only once, before gathering my lunch to begin eating. Leftovers from the night before, or so it would appear. That was the one disadvantage of your little sister packing the lunches for you.

"I mean," he situated himself, "you talking to Suzumiya. It's a bold move but kind of a stupid one don't you think?"

"Not really. She's just like any other girl," I said, though I didn't mean it. Haruhi like the other girls around here? Not likely.

"Any other girl?" Taniguchi's voice got a little louder, almost like he was shouting but not enough to bother anyone else in the class. "Haruhi Suzumiya isn't like any other girl around here. In case you haven't noticed she's a real weird one. She's almost trying to make a point of being weird too, I'm not just insulting her," he said as though I was offended by his comment.

"Right," Kunikida chirped, "like the way she's always going around the school joining and quitting every club."

"Exactly," Taniguchi nodded, "very odd if you ask me. This one time in middle school, she took those things you draw lines on fields with. You know, the ones full of chalk? What are they called… I don't remember. Anyway, she used it to make these weird patterns on the track field and said they were-"

I'd heard this story once before; and nothing had changed. Haruhi was always going to be Haruhi no matter what dimension she was sent into.

"What about Suzumiya's hair," Kunikida asked before taking a bite of his egg roll. I stiffened at hearing that, curious to hear that particular story. In the past Haruhi tied her different depending on the day of the week to ward off alien invaders and such. I spoke to her about one day and the next, she cut it all off. I took the whole thing somewhat offensively at the time, but now I was interested. Haruhi's hair was cut short now, but according to the time frame I hadn't spoke to Haruhi about her hair. Had I?

"I know what you mean. She changed it all the time randomly and then one day just cut it all off," Taniguchi made an unsatisfied sigh at that. "I just don't understand it."

"It actually wasn't random," I found myself muttering, taking a quick bite before continuing on. "She tied her hair in a different place and with a different number of ties depending on the days. The color of the ties also changed with the days, like Wednesday being blue. Monday was a zero and then moving on down Sunday became a six."

"I always thought that Monday was more like a one and Sunday was a seven," Kunikida commented.

"That's what I thought too," I said taking another bite.

"Hold up a minute," Taniguchi said taking his hands. "Why do you know all that? Do you stalk her or something?"

"No," I replied with a shrug, "I asked her about it one day. After that, she cut off her hair."

"Really? I never saw you talk to miss Suzumiya," Kunikida said finishing and packing up his lunch; I did the same.

"It's kind of a long story," I muttered as the bell rang and the guys headed back to their seats. Haruhi reemerged sooner or later, taking her spot behind me. This time, her confusion stare was replaced with that rage as before. I wondered what she'd been doing on her lunch break to make her so vengeful.

Everything was normal, again, during class up until the ending bell had rung. The second it had, Haruhi had snatched me up by my tie and dragged me out of the room. I was both expecting it and not; maybe it was because it was Haruhi's nature no matter what the dimension or time frame to do something like this. Either way, we ended up in one of the dark corners of the school hallways where no one would hear my screams.

"All of a sudden you're keeping quiet," was how she started this odd little conversation. I tried not to look at her directly, but I could see she was annoyed and confused by the whole thing. Haruhi could be easy to read at times; it's rare, but it does happen. She moved her white queen to H5 you see, and I could see right through her.

"I thought you were going to press charges if I spoke to you again," I said quite smugly if I do say so myself. I had to teach Haruhi a lesson that she couldn't toy with people in the ways she thought she could. Black knight B8 to C6 please.

"Stop being stupid," she said letting go of my tie to shove me; though I didn't really move anywhere. "I wouldn't actually press charges on you over something like that," she crossed her arms and circled me like a shark; not the hungry kind of shark either. More like the kind of shark wanting to survive. Maybe to Haruhi I was a threat for mentioning aliens without her permission.

"Look," I said before she could bite my head off, "I was just kidding when I said that. I don't really believe in alien invaders," that she needed to know about anyway. "You're into that kind of stuff right? I was just trying to spark your interest."

"Why?" She asked stopping in front of me, face not changing for a second. "What would you get out of 'sparking my interest'?" She countered, white bishop F1 to C4.

"Well you seem like an interesting girl," I pointed out. It was true, Haruhi was one you'd find incredible.

"Is this your weird kind of way to ask me out?" She asked narrowing her eyes. Now I'd crossed the line.

"What?" I asked, breaking my monotonous expression. "No, I didn't mean for it sound like that. I just meant that you seem like a nice person to talk to." I wasn't exactly sure what I was doing at this point. Maybe by talking to Haruhi, she'd get the idea to form the brigade again. Then what? I ask Koizumi or Nagato to help me set things straight? At this point, it was all I could do.

"I'm not looking to talk to people who find me 'nice to talk to'," she said stomping her foot. This was something Haruhi didn't always do… A new habit in this dimension maybe? "I'm looking for people who can help me track down all kinds of strange happenings. Aliens, espers, time travelers, psychics. That kind of stuff is what I'm trying to find. If you can't help me with that, then I guess we're done talking." She turned to leave but I grabbed her arm, for some reason, to stop her.

"No, wait," I heard myself say almost desperately. I was losing this battle, which could mean being stuck here forever. "I didn't mean to upset you alright," she spun around to glare back at me. Maybe I was getting to her, it reminded me of the first time we were trapped in a time dimensional portal made up of closed space together. When we got out Koizumi continued to go back to that day, telling me to use what I'd learned in there to keep Haruhi happy.

I held onto her arm and then reached out with my other hand pulling her closer. She let her narrowed eyes grow wide with horror as I pressed my lips against hers. For a second, her tense body relaxed against mine only to grow stiff a second later. I'd made my move, I just had to wait for reality to return. Maybe it was a little too late though, I should have pulled back when I had the chance. Black knight G8 to F6. Ah crap.

When I did let her go, her glare was back only this time much worse. I could see some traced of tears in her eyes, but I wasn't sure at this point if it was happiness, sadness or just pure anger. "What the hell do you want with me?" She asked in a harsh voice before shoving me back harder this time, giving enough room for her to free her hand and slap me across the face. White queen from H5 to F7.

The loud noise echoed across the empty hallway and before I could retaliate, she was gone. I was all alone without a way to get back home. The kiss hadn't worked and I was running out of options; this time I had no Koizumi, Nagato or Miss Asahina for that matter to tell me what to do. It was just me.

Checkmate.